


A Holiday

by Merfilly



Category: Doctor Who (1963), Transformers Generation One
Genre: Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-06
Updated: 2013-05-17
Packaged: 2017-10-25 18:40:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 2,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/273506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Optimus Prime. Sarah Jane Smith. Hijinks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [eerian_sadow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eerian_sadow/gifts).



> The first part of this was a crack conversation fill never posted on AO3.

Sarah Jane Smith, investigative reporter at large, had seen everything.

Including giant robots. After all, that one had been there while the Doctor was still figuring out who he was that one time.

Only, this time the Doctor wasn't there, and the robot seemed more observant than hostile.

"Hello?" she called, wondering if it could hear her, understand her, or reply even if it did.

"Hello. I take it from your accent, the strange geography, and my global positioning, that my scientist's design was off somewhat." The giant robot took a knee to be closer to her level. "This is not San Francisco."

"Not by many, many kilometers." Sarah Jane smiled, though, because he seemed far more amused than any robot ought to be.

"Ratchet said I needed a vacation. I'll pretend I did not realize he put Wheeljack up to this." He then remembered his manners. "Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots."

Oh. Sarah had heard rumors of those. American sources, all of the rumors. "Sarah Jane Smith. Do you think I could get an interview? I'd give you the guided tour, where you know, you won't startle everyone out of their wits."

Optimus moved back, and took on the familiar semi form. "Better? And yes, I will, in exchange for your company under this vacation. After all, having sent me, they should have to find and retrieve me now."

Sarah could only laugh in delight, at his trick, and at how in stride he was taking this prank.

`~`~`~`~`

Optimus Prime sighed ever so softly, a sound that made Sarah smile in the cab.

"I take it they are not friendly?"

"Never have been before," she told the robot currently surrounded on all sides by the menacing pepper pots.

"EX-TER-MI-NATE!"

"Still not, apparently," Optimus said in answer, before transforming and catching Sarah Jane Smith in one hand, holding her to his chest as he fired and dodged during the ensuing fight.

Sarah was of the opinion now that any strange alien, not just the Doctor, was invitation for something to invade dear Old England, and how enthused the Brigadier would be to know sometimes the friendly aliens did approve of shooting back.


	2. Well-Met

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sarah Jane has to make introductions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This seems to have decided to take place after Sarah Jane leaves the Doctor, but before she gets her 'Tin-Dog' apology. +hand-waves all other chronology+

The Brigadier looked steadfastly at the robot that had very much been a vehicle not moments before. He quirked one eyebrow, his expression clearly beckoning a debriefing from the perky journalist at his elbow.

"This is the chap who single-handedly undid the Dalek excursion?"

"Brigadier, meet Optimus Prime of the Autobots. Optimus, this is Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stuart, head of UNIT, or the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce."

"It is my honor to meet you, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stuart. Miss Smith has been effusive on telling me of your actions against the aliens that have plagued your country." Optimus inclined his head slightly. "In fact, it is my wish to offer you an alliance, as her tales are alarming in their frequency."

The Brigadier knew there would be channels to explore, red tape to cut, and forms to fill out in triplicate. However, any alien that was friendly enough to win Sarah Jane's approval and actually shot back was an alien worth knowing. "I currently seem to have need of a scientific advisor again, if you are offering an expert's operation in my theater," he told the giant robot.

Optimus could not help but laugh. "I know the mech for the job, but I must warn you, sometimes he blows things up."

"Can't be any worse than the chaos my last one is fond of causing when he blows through," the Brigadier told him with a faint hint of a smile at the corner of his lips.

Sarah Jane coughed, and then she smiled too, looking up at her large friend. "Well, let's not call him by name, or he might whisk in, and find the world's already been saved!"

Optimus filed his questions for later, as he figured out they meant the man she had termed 'the Doctor' in explaining why she knew so much about aliens. He would learn the story in time.


	3. Interlude in the Country

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sarah Jane is showing off her country

"There are fascinating energy signatures all over your nation and its neighbors that we have not been able to explore yet," Optimus told Sarah Jane, as she sat on a blanket in the heath and he remained on the country path as much as he could. The flowers were beautiful, and he did not want to destroy too many of them. "My chief engineer thinks they are residues of visitations in the past from other cultures."

"He'd likely be right, given some of the things I saw when I traveled," she answered him, after clearing her mouth with a sip of tea. The biscuits were too good, and her appetite up from the ride through the countryside. "All sorts of aliens out there, but I never met a robotic one not out to kill the humans it met, no offense."

"Sadly, that is one our counterparts would do. Likely through slavery first but your species is frail compared to us." When her head whipped around at that, Optimus chuckled. "In frame. Your will and mind tends to overcome that greatly."

"Exactly." She was prepared to cut him off at the knees if he took a superior-than-thou attitude. One alien friend with it had been enough. She realized she'd finished her impromptu picnic, and started gathering things together for leaving, careful to lose nothing in this natural place. "Shall we?" she inquired as she stood with basket and blanket in hand.

Obligingly, Optimus folded back into his alternate design, opening a door. "Let's go see what we can before Prowl calls me back to duties."


	4. Visitation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Optimus pays a visit to a friend and meets a new one

"Mistress?"

"Yes, K-9?"

"Mistress, there is an alien life-form parked on the street, and a holographic projection at the door."

Sarah Jane Smith could have wondered when her life came to this. She might also have questioned the calmness she had in going to answer the door for a holographic projection. Of course, the paradoxical part of her reasoning pointed out the projection was waiting politely on the stoop.

"Hello?" she asked, aware of K-9 maneuvering to keep his nose (useful little stunner there) pointed at the projection.

"Hello, Sarah Jane," the tall, muscular man in working clothes and bearing a distinctive voice said. "I decided I needed a new holiday."

Sarah's eyes went from him to the alien life-form parked on the curb. Red and blue artic, minus the trailer… "Optimus?"

"Yes," the hologram said, smiling before crouching down. "And who is this? Another fascinating friend for me to meet?"

"I am K-9 Mark III, a gift from the Doctor to Mistress Sarah Jane Smith," the mobile unit said with a swivel of his ear sensors, pleased to be acknowledged so swiftly.

"I am Optimus Prime," the hologram answered.

"My life," Sarah muttered, leading him in.


	5. Working Holiday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sarah Jane visits Optimus in the US

America could be a strange place, but Sarah Jane Smith had been to stranger. She had not been about to miss out on the opportunity for an exclusive interview that could actually be published with the aliens living in America. That she was already on first name basis with the leader of them was of no never mind, for it only added to her repertoire of questions. Granted, walking into these sorts of things cold was the mark of a hot journalist, if one could pull off a decent interview. She just had a better grasp on what questions to press to get a more solid interview for her article.

Optimus himself could not come to retrieve her from the regional airport; they frowned on his particular mode of transport being parked around airports for fear of terrorism, and possibly that was a very just attitude to take. However, the Lancia that showed up was no stranger to her either, and she smiled at the slightly disheveled holoform the scientist was using these days.

"Playing up to stereotypes, 'Jack?" she questioned, shaking his hand firmly as she gathered up her one traveling bag from the carousel. Her essentials were in the pack on her shoulder, as she had learned early on to keep those as her carry on. She was thankful though that the bag had come through all her switch-overs.

"Disarms people, or so I'm told, Sarah." He looked around a bit more, then frowned. "No K-9? I had hoped to introduce him to Perceptor!"

"Sadly, it is a bit difficult for me to bring him along," she told him. "He is minding the house, and answering any scientific queries UNIT throws his way."

"Ahh... well, next time, I'll just have to ask one of the Aerialbots to come and get you," Wheeljack decided.

That made Sarah Jane feel a deeper warmth to the Autobots, that they were so accepting of her companion. "Shall we?" She smiled, taking the arm he offered, a habit he had picked up from his stay with UNIT. 

"We shall! Optimus is quite excited to have you coming, you should know."

She could only laugh at that, as they walked to the car and got in, the hologram carefully 'driving' except when he began to gesticulate over his stories along the trip.

`~`~`~`~`

Optimus Prime was excited, but he was trying hard not to act as young in spirit as Bumblebee. He contained his energy to the basketball court, taking on Mirage, Tracks, Jazz, and Sideswipe in a one-against-all game. 

That he was clearly winning had the rest of the Autobots who were outside watching sending up catcalls and rude noises at their struggling compatriots. It was to this chaos that Wheeljack delivered his charge, letting her take in the noise and rowdy but good-natured crowd.

"Come on, Mirage, can't you see a goal unless you're sneaking around it?" Cliffjumper hollered.

"Tracks, my main man, how you ever going to get the girls with moves like that?" Raoul called out.

"Going to have to show him how it's done," Sunstreaker growled about his brother.

"Jazz, you're supposed to be playing against him!" Bumblebee yelled to his boss.

"Optimus Prime is just too much mech for all of you!" Spike cheered.

"Basketball, correct? Not much of one for American sports," Sarah said as the car unfolded into the familiar engineer.

"Yeah, Optimus has a thing for them," Wheeljack said with a laugh. "Supposed to be making exo-suits to make it safer for our humans to play but they tend to mix right in without them!"

"That could be... interesting," Sarah Jane decided.

"Come on, he'll have the win any minute now," Wheeljack said, leading her over to the sidelines. She wound up standing between him and Ratchet, matching him to Optimus's descriptions quite easily.

Ratchet looked down, and he opened his mouth just before a sound that had haunted and lurked in Sarah Jane's dreams started echoing near the buried ship. "Oh no... no, this was supposed to be a peaceful trip!" 

"What..." Wheeljack and Ratchet both said, before Red Alert was announcing a security breach. Sarah Jane ignored the sudden rush of robots toward their home, staring steadfastly ahead. The shimmer of blue, a splash of white, and slowly the TARDIS appeared in full form, still as battered as ever. The whimsical part of her mind decided that of all the times she had seen the TARDIS, having it appear in the middle of a mesa with a buried alien ship in an extinct volcano was possibly the most incongruous locale yet.

"Wait for it..." she murmured to herself, but was already walking over to allay any hostility that this army might bring to bear on her old friend.

The door opened, revealing... not her Doctor. Either of them. That flustered Sarah Jane, and made her a little sad, as she wondered just what had come of her 'teeth and curls' Doctor. This man was slightly older, maybe a shade on the frumpy side, although he might have given Wheeljack's hologram a run for the money with the eccentric look he was sporting. Behind him emerged a girl, not much past University age if that, who at least had the wits to look alarmed and suspicious as opposed to the man leaning nonchalantly on a furled umbrella with a question mark handle.

"Ahh, I thought I was heading to Earth, not Cybertron!" He cast a look back to the TARDIS, as if it had misled him.

"Doctor, this is Earth," Sarah said above the commotion of the Autobots, who at least had not shot first at the strangers with their strange craft.

"Sarah? Sarah Jane! You sly girl, sneaking around right where I decided to take a holiday!"

"Holiday, Professor? You said we were going to go look at an anomaly!" the girl informed him.

//Professor?// Sarah thought it, but Optimus had noted her, and the recognition implicit in her words. 

"Autobots, stand down. Sarah Jane Smith, would you introduce us?" Optimus rumbled.

Grudgingly on some parts, and quite happily on others, the assembled mechs did as asked, and parted so that Sarah Jane could reach Optimus's side, up at the forefront of the gathering. 

"Hello, Doctor." She stepped forward, and he hooked the umbrella over his arm to take both her hands.

"It is always good to see you, Sarah," he said warmly. "This is Ace," he added, letting go to reach back for his Companion. She stepped forward, and Sarah Jane shook hands with the girl. 

"Nice to meet you," Sarah said, and she meant it. The Doctor was never meant to be alone, as evidenced by the strange turnout in Gallifrey's Death Zone. She then indicated her own new friends. "Doctor, meet Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots. This one here is Wheeljack, and I had best let other introductions come from them, as I've only just arrived," she added.

"Ahh... the Diaspora era, or perhaps still within the Great War," the Doctor said with a knowing look at the large mechs surrounding them. "So it is Earth," he told Ace, as if only just now convinced of that fact.

"Professor, you said there was an anomaly," Ace reminded.

"What kind?" Wheeljack asked, as one of the larger mechs present moved in and the rest fell back. "Your ship there is a remarkable specimen of a vortex buster."

"Ahh, yes, the TARDIS is rather unique, isn't she?" the Doctor commented, looking pleased at the compliment to his vessel.

"We would like to know more of this anomaly, Doctor, if you would share? My name is Perceptor, and anything your instruments were picking up could potentially be a threat to our new home," the large mech said, catching the Doctor's attention fully.

Sarah Jane slipped closer to the leader of the Autobots, pleased when he immediately lifted her up in a gentle hand. "You do realize this means trouble will soon follow?" she asked quietly, and Optimus's optics glowed with... amusement, she decided.

"Trouble always seems to find us in one form or another," he said. "I'll let him talk to my scientists and engineers, while you and I catch up."

She nodded, as yet another mech, the largest she had ever seen, came to join the small circle that was converging on the TARDIS's occupants. The Doctor seemed rather happy to have such willing ears to listen... audials, she remembered... while the rest of the Autobots seemed to think a new game on the court suited them.

"He's not used to not having to convince the natives to help," she said. She then put on her game face. "And before he can further distract us, I have an interview to acquire, so I may acquit my professional reason for being here and then indulge my holiday. Hopefully with rather less running and being threatened than he normally brings."

Optimus chuckled at her for that, but moved a little away, deciding that on such a nice day they could find a perch near the Ark.

"You have my complete attention until the running starts," he promised her, setting her off into a good laugh.

`~`~`~`~`


	6. Bank Holidays

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sarah Jane explains a custom

"Bank Holiday?"

Optimus Prime asked Sarah Jane with a puzzled tone.

"Well, we have all sorts of them." The small woman smiled, watching the scenery go by. "I don't often bother, as news waits for no day or night, but with you in country…"

"I do not understand."

Sarah Jane patted his steering wheel, stroking her hand over the center of it. "Honestly, the lot of them seem to be so that we mere humans are forcibly reminded to go play." She laughed softly. "It's just made all the better when one has a dear friend to share it with."


End file.
